Interactive: 2016 US election race

Hillary Clinton will have an almighty battle in the general election if she faces Donald Trump.
AP

Explore The Australian Financial Review's visual overview of the electoral college and the US Democratic and Republican candidates as the most powerful nation on earth heads towards its next presidential election.

On the Republican side, supporters are witnessing their Grand Old Party melt down into a raucous civil war over Donald Trump, the party's presumptive presidential nominee.

A recent Florida poll conducted for a business group in the state that shows Hillary Clinton beating Donald Trump by 13 points. If Clinton wins Florida and carries the 19 states (plus D.C.) that have voted for the Democratic presidential nominee in each of the last six elections, she will be the next President of the United States.

From Center for Politics: Election analysts prefer close elections, but there was nothing we could do to make this one close. Clinton’s total is 347 electoral votes, which includes 190 safe, 57 likely, and 100 that lean in her direction. Trump has a total of 191 (142 safe, 48 likely, and 1 leans).
Over the years we’ve put much emphasis on the seven super-swing states: Colorado, Florida, Iowa, Nevada, New Hampshire, Ohio, and Virginia. While some will fall to the Democrats less readily than others, it is difficult to see any that Trump is likely to grab. In fact, four normally Republican states (Arizona, Georgia, Indiana, and Missouri) would be somewhat less secure for the GOP than usual. North Carolina, which normally leans slightly to the GOP, would also be well within Clinton’s grasp in this election after being Mitt Romney’s closest win in 2012.

Hillary Clinton

RAND poll shows the Democrats winning 53 percent of the vote in November, compared to 38 percent for the Republican. The increase in the Democratic margin, from 3.6 percentage points in the previous survey to 15 percentage points in the most recent, is mostly attributed to a public reaction against the takeover of the Republican party by Donald Trump.

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Former Florida governor, brother of one president and son of another. He struggled to shake the dubious legacy of his brother George W; the Iraq war and financial crisis. Bush, 63, is popular among pro-business supporters and the party's establishment elite. His moderate pro-immigration stance makes him less popular among grass roots conservatives. Uneven performances in debates and a lackluster campaign turned Bush, the man many presumed to the eventual nominee, into something of an also-ran. He dropped out of the race after the third voting state of South Carolina.

Marco Rubio

Rubio, 44, cast his entry into the Republican field as a "generational choice." The son of Cuban immigrants, the Florida Senator is viewed as the party's best chance of defeating anti-establishment candidates Trump and Cruz. He fought to strengthen ties with conservatives after he helped lead a failed push for to for laws protecting up to 11 million illegal immigrants in 2013. Rubio spent enormous sums of money and enjoyed the support of the party's establishment for weeks, but disappointed, winning only a few low turnout contests. After promising supporters for weeks that he would win his home state of Florida and use it as a springboard to continue his campaign, Rubio was thrashed by Trump and came in a very distant second. Rubio immediately suspended his campaign.

5/2

A libertarian, the first-term Kentucky senator followed his father, Ron Paul, in running for president. A libertarian, he lobbed criticism at Democrats and fellow Republicans alike over the federal debt and personal liberties. He cast himself as an anti-establishment reformer who could win over young and minority voters. However, there are very few young or minority voters in Republican primaries and also very few libertarians in the Iowa GOP. He finished a distant fifth in Iowa with 4.5 percent of the vote and dropped out of the race days later.

10/1

Rand Paul

16/1

Carly Fiorina

The only female Republican in the field. Once one of the most powerful women in American business, the former Hewlett-Packard Co chief executive positioned herself as an outsider with corporate experience. But her record running the tech company was scrutinised, after it faced financial difficulty and laid off thousands of workers. Fiorina, 60, criticized the only other woman so far seeking the presidency, Democrat Hillary Clinton. Fiorina dropped out after the second voting state of New Hampshire.

22/1

11

Delegate count from states which have voted

Cruz, 45, of Texas is the favourite of ultra-conservartives and is making a big play for the Christian vote. The Senator led the October 2013 government shutdown because he wanted to link funding the budget to repeal of President Barack Obama's healthcare insurance expansion. The Princeton and Harvard educated son of a Cuban immigrant, Cruz has taken a hardline against illegal immigration. A constitutional lawyer, he vows to cut government and eradicate the special interests plaguing Washington. Cruz racked up more wins and delegates than any Republican, apart from Trump, but he failed to get the big breaththrough he needed in the Super Tuesday contests on 1 March. However, wins in Kansas and Maine have positioned Trump as the major, perhaps only, real challenge to Trump. Although widely disliked by both parties in Washington, D.C., some formerly anti-Cruz Republicans are now turning to him in a desperate bid to stop Trump.

Ted Cruz

Rick Perry

25/1

The former governor of Texas hoped his 2016 campaign would go better than it did in 2012, where his defence of immigrants and a disastrous debate performance left him with the reputation as a lightweight out of step with his party. Memories had not faded and Perry's hopes to follow his predecessor as Texas governor, George W Bush, to the White House disappeared when voters and donors largely ignored him. Perry read the writing on the wall and dropped out long before the Iowa caucuses.

The famous ex-neurosurgeon was the only African-American candidate, but he based his appeal on his devout Christian belief rather than his skin color. Carson briefly led the national polls months ago, but repeated displays of policy ignorance and poor debate performances put him near the bottom of the pack. While Republican voters consistently rated Carson as the most likable candidate, he was not able to translate personal regard in to political support. While the GOP's sizable population of evangelical voters should have been his natural constituency, he lost them to the Cruz and Trump campaigns. Carson finished far back in every contest and dropped out in early March.

Ben Carson

3

Jim Gilmore

The former governor of Virginia was the longest of long shots, raising almost no money and generating almost no excitement among Republican voters who were largely unaware of him. After finishing dead last in Iowa and New Hampshire, Gilmore pulled out to the notice of almost no one.

The evangelical pastor and former governor of Arkansas lost his previously strong hold on religious conservatives and his campaign never took off. Although Huckabee won the Iowa caucuses in 2008 he was never a factor eight years later and dropped out of the race after a miserable ninth place finish in Iowa.

Mike Huckabee

33/1

John Kasich

50/1

A Congressman in the 1990s, Kasich is now the governor of the key midwestern state of Ohio and easily the closest thing the Republicans have to a moderate in the race. He is a fiscal and economic conservative. Although he hews close to the Republican line on most issues, he is wary of overseas military committments and has bucked party orthodoxy by expanding Obama's federal government healthcare in his state. A devout Catholic, Kasich justifies his deviations on his need to show compassion for the poor. Kasich has shown some strength among moderate voters in the northeast, but there are not many of those left in the GOP coalition. However, Kasich managed to win his home state of Ohio and take home its 66 delegates, more than doubling his delegate total to date. With Rubio out of the race, Kasich remains as the only establishment-friendly candidate left in a three-man race.

The former Pennsylvania Senator who won Iowa in 2012 and was a distant runner-up to Mitt Romney overall failed to catch fire four years later. Like Huckabee, the devoutly Catholic Santorum based his campaigns on his close relationship with religious conservatives, but that group of voters has moved on to other, newer candidates. Santorum's best state was always going to be Iowa, but he finished in 11th place with a mere one per cent of the vote. Soon thereafter he dropped out of the race and endorsed Marco Rubio.

Rick Santorum

The 69-year-old real estate mogul and TV personality has said that if elected, he would be "the greatest jobs president that God ever created." He has shocked seasoned political observers by sustaining his lead in Republican polls, through a colourful anti-Washington and anti-immigrant campaign. Trump has won 10 of the first 15 contests on the GOP side and is the only Republican who has demonstrated an ability to appeal to all parts of the party electorate. Though still fiercely opposed by most in the party leadership, who think he will lead the party to ruin in November, cracks are starting to form in the wall of establishment opposition, as some in the party hiearchy begin accepting what looks almost inevitable at this point. Donald Trump is the overwhelming favorite to be the Republican nominee for president in 2016.

Donald Trump

67

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The former governor of Louisiana, the Indian-American Jindal is another religious conservative in a crowded field of such candidates. However, Jindal's tenure as governor left the state with budget problems and he proved to be a poor fundraiser and national candidate He dropped out long before the first ballots were cast.

Bobby Jindal

Currently serving his second term as governor of New Jersey, the blunt-talking Republican is more moderate than most of his fellow Republicans. Favored by the party's financial elite, who like Christie's hostility to unions and distaste for culture wars, the governor never caught on with the voters in Iowa or even New Hampshire. Christie was once very popular in New Jersey, but has been embroiled for years in a scandal involving the use of intentional traffic jams to punish mayors who did not back his campaign for re-election. Christie's one bright spot in the campaign was eviscerating Marco Rubio during a debate before the New Hampshire primary. However, the damage to Rubio did not help Christie and he dropped out after a poor showing in New Hampshire.

Chris Christie

The former First Lady, Senator from New York and Secretary of State is the most politically experienced candidate in the field. She succeeded in scaring away virtually all opposition within the Democratic party, except independent Senator Bernie Sanders, who is running as a Democrat. After a brief scare in Iowa and New Hampshire, Clinton has begun rolling up victories based on her popularity with African-Americans and Hispanics -- key demographic groups in the Democratic coalition. Clinton now hopes to largely ignore Sanders and focus more on the general election matchup between herself and, most likely, Donald Trump. Clinton's plan will be to contrast her sparkling resume, moderate views and unquestioned mastery of policy detail against Donald Trump and what she will cast as his erratic and bigoted extremism.

Hillary Clinton

51

The self-described "democratic socialist" is a Senator from Vermont who has been an independent his entire political career, but is now running as a Democrat in a long-shot campaign to unseat the presumed party heir, Hillary Clinton. The white-haired 74-year-old is promising vast new spending programs on health care, education, infrastructure and poverty alleviation. He says he will pay for it with tax increases on the wealthy and some middle class families, as well as cuts to defence. He wants to break up the big banks and drastically reduce America's military committments overseas. He is a friend of unions and a staunch opponent of free trade. While he cannot match Clinton's fundrasing machine among the party's elite donors, Sanders has stolen a page from Barack Obama's playbook in 2008 and built a vast base of middle class supporters who have flooded his coffers with small donations. After putting a scare into Clinton in the first two contests, Sanders faltered in states with large minority populations, particularly in the south. However, a big upset win in Michigan, where his opposition to free trade deals is popular, has given Sanders' campaign a bit of life. He remains a long shot against Clinton, but he has exceeded all expectations.

Bernie Sanders

Martin O’Malley

The former mayor of Baltimore and governor of Maryland based his candidacy on being the progressive alternative to Clinton, but saw that space occupied more effectively by Sanders. O'Malley's campaign struggled to raise money and to answer questions from the Black Lives Matter movement after inquiries were raised over aggressive policing of African-American neighborhoods of Baltimore under O'Malley's mayoralty. O'Malley finished a distant third in Iowa and quickly dropped out.

Scott Walker

The governor of Wisconsin was once thought as a top contender in 2016. His popularity with conservative voters, due to his close relationship with the religious right and his ability to defeat public sector unions, led many pundits to predict Walker would be difficult to beat. While Walker briefly led the Iowa polls, the introduction of Trump into the race stole Walker's thunder and he proved to be a wooden candidate who repelled big donors soon after attracting them. His inability to answer basic questions on foreing policy soured most on Walker and he dropped out of the race - as probably the biggest disappointment of 2016 - before any votes were cast.